I picked the last of the rampant pumpkins, and boy, am I glad that it was at last stopping to bear more fruit. My freezer is so overstacked with the stuff that I hardly have place for anything else. I have experimented a lot as my plants was really doing their utmost, and although I gave away a lot, I was still swamped with this overeager pumpkins. At first I just peeled and cleaned them, and then cut them into cubes to freeze, but as that takes up a lot of space, I decided to make pumpkin fritters, which can be stacked, and don't take such a lot of space. Then I just I started boiling it, mash it up, and froze it in small containers, enough for two meals. In South Africa we eat a lot of sweet stuff with our meals. It had changed the last couple of years, but I still sometimes make a meal like my mum did. That means stewed meat, red or chicken, with potatoes, carrots, beans and just anything you like! This is usually a bitty overcooked, as the meat has to be very tender, although the veggies are put in later. Sometimes this is curried, and we have a lovely prepared curry powder, Cartwrights, that is delicious, and don't really need anything else. My generation had started experimenting with different options, and I nowadays have a huge glass container filled with every spice on the planet that I can use.  Anyway, we kind of stew our pumpkin and sweet potatoes with lots of sugar and butter, until it caramalises, and we even put in a little ginger or cinnamon sometimes. It is a delicious accompaniment for our rich stews and rice, and it is small wonder that we are not the heaviest people on earth.
So yesterday I had cooked up another batch of pumpkin that was left over after my bottles ran out, as I had now started bottling the stuff. I had to knead my two weekly batch of bread, and while I was getting everything together, my eyes fell on the cooked pumpkin. I decided to mash it up, and put it into my bread dough, wondering if it would make a nice batch of bread.
The bread came out beautifully, a lovely soft yellow colour, and don't even taste very sweet! I kept on 'tasting' all through the afternoon, and actually finished a whole loaf by bedtime!
The weather must have been just perfect for pumpkins this year, as only a few people appreciated a gift of a pumpkin, the other having the same bumper crop as myself.
The preparation of the winter veggie beds are coming on nicely, but I will have to do all the work myself, as I refuse to take Nicky back. He is the man I usually take on for a day now and then, as he is one of the guys who drinks so much that the farmers won;t take him on for the fruit picking, and sometimes turns up at my place quite drunk. He had become very militant suddenly since the ANC had taken Haarlem during the last election, and if I tell him what I want done, he will tell me shortly that he can see what must be done, I don't have to tell him, and then gets cross when he had not done what I wanted, and gets a scolding! Like the last time.
I asked for all the weeds to be dugged out, but found later that he had just done a small piece, and the rest was just hacked off! The problem is that most people here have no idea about democracy, and if a party for instance offers them a food hamper every Xmas, they will vote for that party. That is why we will never have a democratic government.